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Upper Elvo Raw Milk Butter

The many springs in the mountain pastures of the upper Elvo Valley, near Biella, have encouraged the production over the centuries of butter made from risen cream and toma cheeses made from the resulting skimmed milk. This is unlike the nearby Valsesia, known for Macagn made from whole milk. Anything left after the butter and cheese have been made is used for various types of ricotta: fiurì (a liquid ricotta, eaten with polenta), mascarpin (a fresher ricotta) and srasc (an aged, smoked ricotta, formed into small balls). Pezzata Rossa d’Oropa cattle are farmed around here, a native, hardy breed well suited to the steep pastures.

Season

The Presidium wants to promote the butter made in the summer in mountain dairies, where the cheesemakers still live in ancient stone huts and where butter is still kept in fraidel, the dialect name for the stone tanks inside the houses fed by the gelid spring water. The producers have preserved the old wooden butter molds, which they use to imprint on the butter pats the symbols historically used to identify which family produced them: flowers, animals or initials.

Presidium

The Presidium wants to promote the butter made in the summer in mountain dairies, where the cheesemakers still live in ancient stone huts and where butter is still kept in fraidel, the dialect name for the stone tanks inside the houses fed by the gelid spring water. The producers have preserved the old wooden butter molds, which they use to imprint on the butter pats the symbols historically used to identify which family produced them: flowers, animals or initials.